Red Metal has a significant land holding in the highly prospective Mount Isa Inlier in Northwest Queensland, a region which is host to a number of significant copper-gold mines such as Mount Isa, Ernest Henry and Osborne. The Mt Isa area is also part of the larger Carpentaria Province, which hosts several Tier 1 lead-zinc-silver mines such as Cannington, George-Fisher, Mount Isa, Century, McArthur River and Lady Loretta.

Red Metal has a range of targeted areas prospective for giant copper-gold and silver-lead-zinc mineralisation within this prospective terrain.

Maronan Silver-Lead Project

The Maronan lead-silver and copper-gold project is an emerging large base metal deposit in the world class Carpentaria Province which hosts several Tier 1 lead-zinc-silver mines including the Dugald River deposit which is under development by MMG.

Maronan deposit has a JORC 2012 compliant Inferred Resource of 30.75Mt @ 6.5% lead with 106g/t silver (using a 3% lead cut-off grade) and 11Mt @ 1.6% copper with 0.8g/t gold (using a 1.0% copper cut-off grade). This equates to approximately 2Mt of contained lead with 104.9Moz of silver plus 170,000t of copper with 300,000oz of gold. The deposit remains open down plunge.

In early 2016, Red Metal announced the positive outcome of the Preliminary Mine Scoping Study which suggested the inferred resources may have scope to be viably mined. The study used a lead price forecast of $US2200 per tonne.

Red Metal is canvasing potential interest for joint venture funding on the project from select third parties. Several companies have initiated detailed data reviews which are ongoing.

Base metal and lead price increases over the past five months has renewed interest in the project.

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Scope exists for additional copper and gold mineralised structures hosted in the brittle quartzite sequences that surround Maronan. Ground electromagnetic surveying designed to test this concept is set to start mid-June.

Three Ways Project

Red Metal has secured three new exploration license applications 130 kilometres along trend from MMG’s recently commissioned Dugald River zinc-lead-silver mine in the Mount Isa region of Northwestern Queensland.

A regional data review by Red Metals exploration team lead to the discovery of historic magneto-telluric (MT) data that has provided key evidence as to the zinc potential of this under explored region.

Modelling of the MT data has enabled Red Metal to interpret a thick, highly conductive sedimentary sequence located below 300 to 500 metres of younger cover which has the potential to host giant stratiform lead-zinc-silver deposits.

The prospective sequence is interpreted over 60 kilometres of strike and has never been drill tested.

Red Metal believes the broad geological and geophysical setting at Three Ways compares favorably with that of fertile sub-basins hosting giant zinc deposits elsewhere in the province.

It is proposed to utilize a modern, deep penetrating, electromagnetic technique, such as MT surveying, to map and prioritize highly conductive zones within the prospective stratigraphy for drill testing.

Lawn Hill Zinc-Lead-Silver Project

Red Metal’s first Lawn Hill drill holes (LH-17-01 and LH-17-02) targeting two large electromagnetic conductors C1 and C2, intersected thick sequences of heavily carbonaceous and pyritic mudstone belonging to the zinc prospective Riversleigh Siltstone that explain the anomalies. Trace element signatures and ratios used on a basin scale to vector towards McArthur River style zinc mineralisation indicate the holes are distal, perhaps greater than 40 kilometres from any metal source.

The Teck/Pursuit Bluebush prospect is an extensive area of historic drilling containing numerous wide intercepts of low-grade stratiform zinc, lead and silver mineralisation indicative of a nearby metal source region, perhaps within less than 40 kilometres.

Assessment of other conductive features identified in the 2017 VTEM survey is ongoing. Targets under review include C4 and C9.

Leichhardt and Corkwood Copper-Gold Projects

A high resolution airborne magnetic survey was flown over both the Leichhardt and Corkwood tenements this quarter aiding the definition of new, previously untested, Iron-Oxide Copper-Gold (IOCG) target concepts for drill testing.

These projects are situated about 100 kilometres northwest of Glencore’s large Ernest Henry copper-gold mine and about 60 kilometres north of Copper Mountain's advanced Little Eva copper-gold deposit.

At Leichhardt, Red Metal’s first drill hole on the large Doppler magnetic target intersected magnetite-biotite altered porphyritic intermediate volcanic rock types comparable to the halo alteration that surrounds the Ernest Henry deposit. The new magnetic data over Doppler has revealed both high and very low magnetic zones within the broader anomaly that remain untested. Red Metal speculates that they may reflect zones of increased sulphide mineralisation.

Similarly, the new magnetic data over Corkwood has imaged a very low magnetic cross-cutting structure associated with a deep gravity low. This feature may also relate to a zone of increased sulphides and deeper weathering.

Follow-up drilling on these new IOCG target concepts is planned once gravity surveying over the Gulf targets has been completed.

Emu Creek Copper-Gold Project

The Emu Creek farm-in agreement with Chinova Resources Limited covers a series of geophysical and structural copper-gold targets located within trucking distance of their Osborne copper and gold mine.

Exploration next quarter will include drilling on a significant chargeability anomaly on the Little Sandy Creek prospect just nine kilometres north of the mine.

Gulf Copper-Gold Project

The Gulf copper-gold project incorporates multiple new tenement applications over several standout geophysical anomalies in an under explored extension to the Cloncurry terrain which offers scope for large IOCG breccia systems.

A review of public geophysical data has shown that gravity data has only been collected on widely spaced regional grids (4x4 kilometre and 2x2 kilometre) and is too coarse to define ore body size targets for drill testing.

This quarter, Red Metal flew high resolution airborne magnetic surveys over five of the Gulf projects. It also reprocessed historic company gravity data over the Gibson’s Tank region which has helped the ranking of 5 magnetic targets ahead of planning infill gravity surveying and future drill tests.

Red Metal will be one of the first companies to apply modern, high resolution, infill gravity surveying as an IOCG targeting tool over the Gulf region. Gravity surveying is expected to commence next quarter.

Cannington South Copper-Gold Project

The key target in this project is a Cannington geophysical look-alike called Mount Skipper located 90 kilometres south of the Cannington mine under 400-500 metres of younger sedimentary cover. Last quarter, Red Metal was awarded up to $104,000 of funding support under the Queensland Government’s collaborative exploration initiative towards the testing of this target.

South32’s large Cannington lead-zinc-silver mine and Red Metal’s Maronan lead-silver deposit were both discovered by drilling a standout bulls-eye magnetic target located within geophysically subdued clastic sequences known as the Mount Norna Quartzite. Red Metal has used regional magnetic and gravity data sets to search for analogous targets in covered terrains south of the Cannington deposit as a priority. The Mount Skipper target resulted from this approach and is proposed to be drill tested during the 2018 field season.